Physiology
by owlpostagain
Summary: All Demyx wants is to prove to Zexion that Nobodies are, indeed, capable of friendship. In-game Zemyx for 6/9/10. Happy Zemyx Day!


Happy Zemyx Day!

This story originally started as a music meme used as a writing exercise. The first section, the only part told from Zexion's point of view, was the result of writing whatever came to mind during the 5:18 of Brand New's "Jesus Christ." I liked it, so I played with it. I'm undecided about whether or not I love it, but…Zemyx day has arrived, so it's being posted.

I generally despise when people make Demyx out to be this dumbass, flaky, cowardly, weak little bitch. First of all, he has to be a fairly strong individual to have even become a member of Organization XII, and he must maintain some level of usefulness in order to _stay_ there. Secondly, the little bastard kicked my ass for an hour straight before I finally managed to beat him…so yeah, definitely not a weak little bitch. While I acknowledge that Demyx still seems…out of character. I'd be happy to defend myself, should you be interested.

**Things I Own:** Nothing remotely mentioned in this story. So, uh…a temperamental laptop, a PSP that my sister bought solely in anticipation of Birth by Sleep, a Sigma Nu shirt that I wore for most of the 20+ hours I spent on this story (yeah, I know…ew).

**Things I Don't Own: **Zexion. Demyx. Axel. Organization XIII. Arpeggio. Anything that remotely resembles something that belongs to Square Enix.

Enjoy =) 

* * *

_Number Nine stood at the center of the circular room, dwarfed by the high white chairs surrounding him, dripping, shivering, leaving a puddle of crystal water on the marble floor. Zexion watched with his visible eyebrow raised as the newest member of Organization XIII slowly drew his hood back._

_The slate haired Nobody drew a quick, sharp breath at the angular nose, the high cheekbones, the straggling strands of sandy blond hair falling into eyes that best resembled the ocean after a storm. Zexion hadn't seen the ocean in a long, long time._

_He watched him. Watched the Melodious Nocturne, watched the boy with his fingers curled around the sitar, silent save for the sounds he made with his instrument and the occasional start of surprise when he tweaked a string and water fell from the air. Zexion watched, half hidden behind a sheet of silvery hair, as Demyx raised both blue eyes and stared right back at him, searching for something Zexion didn't know how to find. He didn't know how to help the blond boy, didn't know why he wanted to. He couldn't be the beautiful musician's god._

* * *

He sat in silence, legs curled like a pretzel, sitar cradled protectively in his lap, watching the tide slowly creep up the sandy shore. He was waiting. He didn't know what he was waiting for, but instinct told him to sit here, dripping, cold, still wrapped in the clothing he'd _died_ in, and wait. So he did.

He wasn't sure how long he waited. It might have been minutes, it might have been days. Months, maybe, or even years. The tide rose and the tide fell and the tide rose again, but he'd lost count of how many times the waves lapped at his knees over a hundred cycles ago. He didn't mind. He felt no need to eat, no need to sleep, no need to do anything but sit, silently, cradling his precious sitar and _waiting_ for that unknown entity.

It arrived in the form of a quivering redheaded beanpole, towering over the sand in a black leather coat and knee high boots, peering down at him from behind long lashes and sculpted cheekbones. The redhead pulled him to his feet with surprisingly gentle hands, cocked his head to the side, and stared, poison eyes raking over the battle-torn clothing, the angry ocean eyes, the tightly clutched sitar.

He didn't speak, and neither did the redhead. Words weren't necessary as the taller boy gestured to the air behind him, ripping a gaping purple hole in the sky. The redhead took off without a backwards glance, not waiting to see if he would follow. He did. He followed him straight through the hole and down a long, empty corridor, through another hole and straight into a blindingly white room. Thirteen thrones of varying heights curved along the room's circular walls, empty, for the moment.

"Wait here."

He nodded. He was good at waiting, had perfected his waiting skills as of late. He stood in the center of the white white circle, eyes roving over the marble chairs as he hugged his instrument to his chest.

His arm slipped, fingers brushed along two strings, and the sound that emanated from the vibrations had _certainly_ not been caused by the wooden bellied instrument. He glanced down just in time to see the pillar of water rocket skyward, resisting gravity just long enough to gain a decent height before the whole lot of it came crashing back down to earth, drenching him in the process. Spluttering, spitting, hissing like a drowned cat, he shook his head, spraying water from the long blond tips.

"Well, at least now we have someone to clean up the mess next time Axel gets bored and burns down the East Wing."

He jumped, narrowly avoiding brushing against the sitar again. A man sat perched in the chair just slightly to his right, glancing down at him with his one good eye.

"What's your name, kid?"

He had to think about it. He remembered a name, and maybe before, before he'd been sitting on the shore for an indeterminate period of time, he would have claimed it as his own, but now something about it just didn't seem…appropriate.

"I – it was – is…"

"Was is, indeed, the appropriate term. No matter."

The man waved the hand not propping up his chin and four letters burned the air before him, floating down from their height to circle around the white floor. He watched them, the D, the Y, the M, the E, whirling faster and faster as they spun around his ankles, licking at his knees as they blurred together, spinning, spinning.

They stopped directly in front of his sea foam eyes, and this time there were five letters, an extra X that hadn't been there before. He read the name floating before him, and this name suited him much more than his previous thoughts.

"Demyx. My name is Demyx."

"Well now, he has a name. Got it memorized, Demyx?"

The redhead was back, stepping out from another dark corridor, something dark and shapeless cradled in the crook of his arm. At first Demyx thought it was darkness itself, wrapped around the taller man's limbs, but as the redhead gathered it in his free hand and shook it out, he realized it was fabric, not matter. A coat, pants, leather gloves and boots. They were thrust unceremoniously at him, green eyes twinkling at him as the thin lips curled in a smirk.

"_My_ name's Axel. Number VIII. Memorize. And get dressed. The rest of the Organization will be here any second."

Demyx dressed silently, shamelessly, peeling his wet clothes from his body and pulling on the pants, lacing up the boots. He zipped the coat with his bare fingers, pulling the hood up over his face before plunging his fingers into the leather gloves. Axel and the man with the eye patch ignored him, and each other, sitting in chairs on opposite sides of the room. The redhead was playing with a ball of fire cupped in his palm, poking and prodding the flames with his free hand.

Demyx stood, waiting, eyes on the empty chairs in front of him. Directly across from him stood the chair branded with a I; on its left stood numbers III, V, and VII, the right side boasted II, where the man with the eye patch sat pulling his hood over his head, a IV, VI, and Axel, poised in the seat marked with an VIII. The numbers stopped after the eighth chair, leaving five chairs unassigned.

Some of the arrivals were silent, seamless, at Number II's had been, others accompanied by soft hisses of displaced air, two arrived mid conversation, their voices appearing well ahead of their respective figures. There were eight in total, all save Axel with their cloaks zipped tight and their hoods raised. The man in the first chair rose and spoke.

His name was Xemnas, the superior, Number I. They were Organization XIII, a collection of Nobodies with the superior ability to remember their lives before they had been separated from their Hearts. Separated. Demyx stopped listening for a moment, the word echoing around the apparently empty cavity in his ribcage. Separated from their hearts. He was heartless. He had _died_, had his heart ripped from his soul and _eaten_ by darkness. Xemnas continued to talk, but Demyx had stopped listening. Something about feelings and regaining their hearts and world domination; he didn't particularly care. It didn't seem particularly important in light of the previous revelation. He had lost his _heart_.

The meeting ended as quickly as it began. Xemnas, satisfied that his newest recruit had been indoctrinated appropriately into the Organization, dismissed them with a disinterested wave of his hand, simultaneously ripping open a new portal and stalking from the room without a second thought. The others were slower to leave, some of them speaking to each other, disappearing slowly, sometimes alone, sometimes in pairs. Axel gave him a smirk and a wave, Number II left with a nod. Demyx waited until he was alone to pull his hood from his face, turning to search the room for a door.

He was not alone. One member still sat unmoving in his chair, branded with the number VI, and the sharp intake of breath echoed in the silent room. Demyx eyes snapped up of their own volition, and for the first time since he'd opened his eyes on the beach he _felt_ something other than utter _indifference_.

Charcoal gray hair hung in jagged bangs, hiding one eye and a solid half of the boy's face from sight, but the half that Demyx saw was more than enough for him. A single cerulean eye, pale lashes, face older and sharper than the last time Demyx had seen it, but it was _undeniably_ a face that Demyx knew, a face that Demyx would know even if fifteen, fifty years passed between sightings.

Ienzo. 

* * *

It was his _instinct_ to run, his _instinct_ to claw his way up the smooth marble chair and hurl himself into the rapidly sealing corridor, to sprint down the dark pathway and tackle the slate haired boy to the ground, pinned beneath him until he promised to talk, to listen, and not to run away. It was his instinct, and for that very reason he decided to do precisely the opposite.

Every decision has consequences, and before he could even begin to consider the consequences of this decision Demyx came to a more pressing realization. He was sealed rather solidly in a room with high, smooth walls and no visible door. The blond didn't know how to open the air with his fingers, and he hadn't paid close enough attention to the Superior to remember if he'd been given instructions on how to leave the room.

No matter. He would wait. He was good at waiting.

He settled himself quietly on the floor, sitar balanced across his knees, back against the stone throne to the right of Number VII. He supposed, seeing that Axel was apparently the eighth and final member of the organization, that he was Number IX. This would be his chair, perhaps it already _was_ his chair. He considered the four chairs remaining chairs, varying heights and sizes, similar in their blankness. Had these members yet to arrive? Were they coming? Where were they? Were there to be exactly thirteen, no more, no less?

Demyx had no answers to these, nor did he know who to ask, but the alternative thought process made his intestines squirm and wriggle, so he avoided thinking about the Nobody with Ienzo's face.

The chairs left him with too many questions and not enough answers, though, which left little room for a distracting analysis at this point in time. Demyx shifted his gaze to the instrument lying unassumingly across his lap, contemplative eyes falling on the taut strings. The blond lifted the sitar gently, placing it carefully on the floor at his feet before peeling his gloves from his fingers. Cautiously, but without hesitation, he reached one hand forward and _strummed._

This time he followed his instincts to perfection, allowing his fingers to assume intrinsic control as they caressed the instrument, coaxing various sounds from various strings, each and every action resulting in some responding appearance of water. He watched it fall, rise, splash across the floor, crash against the wall, blast a hole through the empty space between the fourth and sixth chairs.

Demyx froze, hands hovering over the sitar as he stared at the gaping hole in the wall across from him. He clambered to his feet, gathering his abandoned gloves and his instrument as he quietly crossed the room, peering through the cracked stone and out into a deserted hallway.

He wondered, almost as an unrelated incident, why he didn't feel guilty. The blond had just blown a human-sized hole in the wall of a seemingly important room; this was undoubtedly a poor life decision, most likely something he would get into trouble for. Shouldn't he feel guilt? Remorse? Something other than a vague interest in how powerful that water blast must have been to punch a hole through solid matter?

For that matter, shouldn't he be feeling _something_ right now? He was in an unknown building with an unknown number of inhabitants, the only one of whom he had recognized thus far had been someone he'd presumed dead for at least the last three years. He apparently now possessed a magical, water element sitar, was dressed head to toe in BDSM-chic leather, and had apparently _died_ in order to get here, wherever here was. Shouldn't he be _panicking_ at the highest level of uncontrollable meltdown right now?

"You should probably take a breath."

Axel stood leaning casually against the wall next to the gaping hole, casually brushing dust and debris from his previously pristine cloak.

"I mean, you don't really need to breathe, technically, but it's a nice feeling nonetheless. Hyperventilating about the fact that you're _not_ hyperventilating, on the other hand, is not such a nice feeling. So breathe."

Demyx complied. He leaned his sitar carefully next to the redhead and took several deep, calming breaths. Axel watched him with a raised eyebrow, silently appraising the blond standing before him.

"Don't stress about the hole, Xemnas won't even see it. The Dusks will take care of it before you know it. And it's totally his fault that the room doesn't have a damn door anyway. Lazy ass doesn't like having to walk around anymore than necessary. I'm telling you, give it a year and he'll be – are you sure you're not still having a no-panic-attack attack?"

"I'm just...I should be in full on panic mode. Instead, my sitar makes geysers out of thin air."

Axel smirked, a sound vaguely resembling laughter slipping from between his lips as he surveyed the blond before him.

"Ordinarily it would fall on me to explain this to you. However, for the first time since Saïx and I got here Number Six is blowing things up instead of squinting at some dusty textbook or another. I'm not entirely convinced that this little temper tantrum and your arrival are mutually exclusive events…so instead of explaining anything remotely useful to you, I'm going to tell you that he prefers the practice rooms closer to the basement, the nearest of which you can access by following the stairs at the end of this corridor until they don't go down any further. Got it memorized?"

The redhead didn't wait for Demyx' answer. He pushed himself off the wall, tossed the blond a mocking salute, and took off down the hallway, black coat rippling behind him as he strode away. 

* * *

He heard the sounds long before he reached the bottom of the stairs, heard the echoing of matter shattering and exploding against air and marble and shadow from almost an entire flight above the basement floor. Demyx rounded the end of the stairwell cautiously, patiently, unsure of what he would find waiting for him.

Another hallway, it would seem. Vast as the rest of the hallways he had seen, littered with doors and doorways dotting the walls at random intervals. He merely stood and watched, momentarily baffled, until a particularly violent explosion rocked the basement, one door shuddering just barely a second before the rest.

The blond strode purposefully across the hall to the door in question, grabbing for the handle without hesitation and yanking it wide. Something bright and dazzling hit the doorway mere inches from his head, exploding in a showering illusion of stone, dust, and light.

Demyx waited. He waited, calmly, quietly, for the dust to settle and the figure in the center of the room to look up from the book cradled in the crook of one arm, another ball of light slowly growing from his free hand. The light disappeared the moment the single cerulean eye met his own, snuffed out quicker than a candle in a storm.

"Axel told me where to find you," he said offhandedly, stepping into the room and closing the door behind him. The slate haired boy, who had previously been standing motionless in the center of the room, scoffed and slammed his book closed, clutching it to his chest.

"Oh, good, befriend the sadistic pyromaniac."

"Well," Demyx voice was quiet and calm as his demeanor, "I would have made an attempt for the quiet kid in the back of the class, but he was too busy _throwing a fucking temper tantrum_." His sea-glass-green eyes betrayed the nonchalance in his voice, flashing with something incomprehensible at the moment.

"I would hardly –"

"Don't play dumb with me, Ienzo, it's unbecoming on you." All traces of composure had vanished from the blond's voice, suddenly frigid and harsh.

"That is not my name." The smaller boy's voice was quiet, barely a hiss of breath between teeth, but Demyx had had _years_ of practice plucking this particularly voice from the air. He knew this, had paid enough attention to his own renaming to understand that while the boy standing before him was undoubtedly the figure he knew years ago as Ienzo, the name fit him no better now than the clothing they had worn back then would.

"Duly noted," the blond said dryly, "although I suppose I would have known that if you hadn't fled the room like it was on _fire_ the second you saw my face. I have to say, Zo, I would have envisioned a better reception than you running away with your tail between your legs."

"That is not –"

"Then what is it?" Demyx snapped. The other boy's visible eyebrow was climbing rapidly up his pale forehead, expression resembling the ghost of an emotion Demyx vaguely remembered as surprise.

"Zexion."

"Forgive me, Zexion. I don't particularly _care_ what your name is, I just want to know why you left without so much as a 'surprise, you probably thought I was dead but, well, here I am.'"

"I _am _dead."

"You are _standing right in front of me_. Clearly, Zo, you are not –"

"_Zexion_. My name is Zexion." Demyx blinked at the tone laced through the words the smaller boy interrupted him with. It was _something_, something _important_, but even as he wracked his brain for the name of the elusive thought it continued to dance just out of his grasp.

"I don't _care_ what your name is, you're still –"

"Ienzo is _dead_, Demyx. Ienzo is dead. He died a drawn out, miserable, pathetic death exactly when you thought he did. I may _look_ like Ienzo, but I can assure you that I am _not him_."

The finality in his tone was irrefutable, regardless of how badly Demyx wanted to disagree. Zexion closed the conversation with the same efficient snap with which he had closed his book, still clutched between white knuckles. Demyx focused on the hands pressing the leather bound to the slate haired boy's chest. White knuckled, trembling slightly, nails gouging crescent shaped marks in the binding, they were the only sign that Zexion wasn't as entirely unaffected by the conversation as he pretended.

Wordless, understanding a dismissal when delivered one, Demyx spun on his heel and walked silently from the room. Just before the door clicked shut behind him he heard a sound suspiciously like that of a fairly large, heavy object being hurled forcefully at the floor. 

* * *

Demyx was _lost_. His plan had been to retrace his steps back to the white room, hoping that from there he could find Axel, or at least _someone_. Maybe he'd miscounted the number of stairwells he'd climbed up, or down, but there was definitely no sign of the large, circular chamber, or of the wide hole he'd blasted in the wall, no matter how many different corridors he wandered down. More importantly, though, there was no sign of his sitar, which he hadn't let out of his sight for as long as he could remember. And now he couldn't even find the stairs, having made one too many random turns down identical-looking hallways. The blond briefly considered attempting to open a portal in the air the way he'd seen the others do, but even if he had been successful he wouldn't have known what to do with it. Where would he have gone?

"Why aren't you with Axel, kid? He left to find you ages ago."

Demyx shoulders sagged, a slight sigh escaping his lips as he caught sight of the familiar black cloak drifting towards him. It was the same man he'd met earlier, Number II, and despite the eye patch and the rather nasty looking scar blossoming across his jaw, he wore a fairly friendly smile on his face.

"He did." Demyx shrugged. The man raised his good eyebrow at him; it was kind of a weird look, what with the eye patch and all. "He sent me off to get answers from Zexion instead."

The eyebrow, if possible, rose higher.

"Did he now? Why the hell would he do something like that? Zexion, of all people. As if!" The man with the salt and pepper hair snorted, a broad grin on his face at the thought of anyone actively seeking out an audience with the Cloaked Schemer.

"Zexion's spent the better part of the hours since my arrival having a hissy fit in the basement. I believe Axel was experimenting." Demyx' voice was dry, the barest dash of sarcasm sprinkled through it. The other man seemed to appreciate this, nodding in approval at, it would seem, both the words and the way in which they were said.

"Mixing to elements to see if they would cause an explosion?"

"Precisely."

And at this the man openly laughed, a sound that caused a jolt of something he couldn't quite identify to shoot through Demyx' stomach. It had been a long time since he had heard laughter; it sounded odd, here, of all places. The sound bounced off the cold marble walls, the echo a mockery of the previously genuine sound.

"I like you, blondie. The name's Xigbar; I'm the guy with the guns. C'mon, let's go find Flamesilocks. Experiments or not, it's his job to make sure you're not wandering around like a sad puppy. You know, you look kind of familiar. Psht, as if I would forget hair like _that_. What is it, a mullet? A Mohawk? A fauxhawk? A mollet? A mulhawk? I mean it's cool, man, sure…"

Demyx was content to hang back, dogging Xigbar's steps as the older man rambled on and on about something inconsequential or another. The conversation was lightly sarcastic and full of casual chatter, and most importantly something that Demyx didn't really need to pay attention to. His mind wandered ahead down different corridors, down long, winding flights of stairs, below the foundation of this _castle_, as Xigbar had called it. He wondered if Zexion was still down there, if the slate haired boy had picked up the book he threw to the ground and continued as he had been before Demyx interrupted him. He was almost tempted to ask, almost tempted to see if Xigbar would lead him back to the basement instead of off to wherever Axel was, but just as he opened his mouth to speak the man in question came to an abrupt halt.

The corridor had emptied into a large, semi circular room, the rounded wall of which boasted floor to ceiling windows the likes of which Demyx had never seen before. The room was littered with a random assortment of couches and coffee tables, all of which, save one, were empty.

Axel sat half-sprawled across one of the far couches, balancing a silver and red chakram on one, long finger. His free hand spun the wheel slowly, lazily, eyes following the weapon's progress with ill-disguised boredom.

"Axel!"

The redhead jumped, the spiked wheel overbalancing and dangling dangerously off his gloved finger. Demyx flinched, certain the nearest spike was seconds away from piercing straight through Axel's stomach, but by the time he glanced back up the weapon had disappeared entirely, the redhead climbing to his feet completely unscathed. Demyx blinked.

"Things with Zexion didn't go so well?"

Demyx snorted, which was all the response Number VIII needed. He laughed, scratching the back of his neck with one gloved hand.

"Sorry, man. Thought maybe the chance to hash it out might be a good thing, ya know?"

"As if! You just wanted to play, Red. Admit it."

Axel chuckled, hand still tangled in the spikes at the bottom of his neck. His face was oddly expressionless, but his tone had something sympathetic mixed into it.

"Guilty. C'mon, I'll make it up to you with a nice little Q & A. I know you weren't paying attention to a word the Superior said earlier…nah man, don't worry about it. He totally thought he had your attention to the entire time. But I remember, I was there not so long ago. It's kinda hard to listen to trivial details after someone tells you your heart just got eaten, yeah? Anyway, I'll answer any questions you got, maybe even some you haven't thought of yet."

And he did. He taught Demyx how to open the air in a portal to darkness, how to summon a Dusk should he ever need one. He explained a little about the castle they were living in, the world the castle existed in. He went into further detail about the regaining their hearts and world domination thing Xemnas had mentioned, describing the supposed Kingdom Hearts. Demyx wasn't quite sure how he felt about that part, although according to what Axel had explained to him, he shouldn't really be _feeling_ anything.

This part, of everything he had been told, was undoubtedly the most unsettling. The largest problem here, of course, was that the very fact that it was unsettling was, in fact, unsettling, because according to Axel he shouldn't even be able to _feel_ unsettled. Demyx stored this train of thought in the back of his mind, determined to review it again later. For now, Axel and Xigbar, who apparently had had nothing better to do than sit on the couch with them and add snide commentary to Axel's explanations, were arguing over which of them would begin his weapons training.

"It's _your_ job."

"You saw him, Xig, his element's water."

"So?"

"So he'd _extinguish me_ with a single shot! Water trumps fire, got it memorized?"

Demyx cleared his throat, interrupting whatever comeback Xigbar was preparing to throw at the redheaded pyro. They both turned, surprise lacing their features. They had, it would seem, forgotten about him.

"Uh, as much as I'd love to play with water, I haven't got a clue where Arpeggio is."

Axel slapped his forehead with a gloved hand, shooting Xigbar a biting look when the graying man snickered. He snapped the fingers of his free hand, Demyx' sitar materializing into the air between them.

"You left it in the hallway, I put it away for you."

"Put it…away?"

Axel smirked, glancing briefly at Xigbar as he passed the blue instrument back to the blond.

"Don't worry," he laughed, "Xiggy here will teach you _all_ about it." And before either of them could move, faster than Demyx had had the impression that the redhead was capable of moving, Axel ripped a portal into the air and vanished. Xigbar sighed, running one gloved hand over his face as he turned to study the newest Nobody.

"Come on, kid," he gestured, opening his own portal in the space next to them, "play time." 

* * *

Despite his sarcastic mumblings and fairly intimidating appearance, Xigbar was a surprisingly patient and competent teacher. He worked with Demyx, not just on that first day, but day after day after day one, good-naturedly accepting the accidental blasts of water and providing a willing sparring partner. Demyx, despite his initial misgivings, was a surprisingly _good_ fighter. Even Xigbar seemed to think so, cuffing him cheerfully across the back of the head as the blond took out another three of Xigbar's Sniper Nobodies.

It was a slow process, undoubtedly, but Demyx was patient, and slow as it was, he was adjusting. He was adjusting, not just to fighting with his formerly passive instrument, but to life in the Castle That Never Was and everything that came with it. It was an easy routine to fall into; breakfast at his leisure, reconvene in the Gray Area for that day's assignment, complete the mission, be back in time for dinner. Lather, rinse, repeat.

Thus far, as the newest member of the Organization, Demyx had been partnered for every mission he was sent on. He tagged along with Axel on a few easy missions to Twilight Town, and once with Saïx on a rather bizarre trip to Wonderland, but mostly partnered Xigbar. Xigbar taught Demyx how to sneak with a ninja-like stealth, and Demyx taught Xigbar the art of patience. They make a good team.

The day of Demyx' first solo mission, however, took the boy completely by surprise. Xemnas, it appeared, was holding audience with Numbers II through VI, leaving just Saïx, Axel, and Demyx to complete the required list of disturbances to explore; one recon mission in the Pride Lands, two flares of Heartless activity in Twilight Town and the Land of the Dragons. Axel snatched up the recon mission before Saïx or Demyx could so much as blink; Demyx deferred to his superior, offering him his choice of the remaining two assignments.

Which lead him here, panting, doubled over on the mountainside, boots soaked through with snow and ice, knuckles white under his leather gloves as he clutched his sitar between shaking fingers, staring into what had to be the _nastiest_ snowstorm this mountain had ever seen. His mission statement dictated that he find the nest of Heartless hidden _somewhere_ inside this mess, particularly the creature believed to be causing the violent weather.

The problem that hadn't, apparently, been considered by the powers that be (Saïx) doling out the missions was that _water_ was a fairly useless weapon in a _snowstorm_. His clones froze mere seconds after they appeared, and his water seemed sluggish, slushy, the Heartless brushing it away carelessly, mockingly. He was useless here.

The Heartless knew it too. They circled him, caging him in, taunting and cackling, circling closer, closer, tightening around him until he was nothing more than a fly in web, entirely incapable of doing anything more than just waiting to die. He was going to die. He was going to die, and it was going to be for _real_ this time.

And it was with that realization that a second epiphany dawned on him. Hands shaking, palms sweating, face draining of color as blood rushed in his ears; this was fear. He was afraid, _terrified_, of the Heartless bearing down on him, of the thought of dying, of being wiped from this mountainside without a second thought. Was there anybody to even acknowledge his passing?

A single, crystal tear trailed down one pale, frozen cheek. The Heartless closest to him wrapped long, spindly fingers around his throat. Somewhere in his peripheral vision, something spiked and silver hurtled towards him. 

* * *

Demyx had always imagined death to be a cold thing, but he was so warm he may as well have been lying in a bonfire. He paused, reconsidering the thought. Were dead people aware of the temperature? Were they, for that matter, aware at all? He cracked his eyes open. Fire engine red hair and bottle green eyes hovered over him, peering down into his bloody face.

"Do. Not. Die. Got it -"

"Memorized," Demyx promised, coughing. His throat was raw, bruised, he hissed as he accidentally pressed his fingers too hard into the damaged skin.

"What happened?"

"I finished up pretty quickly in the Pride Lands." Axel explained carefully, sitting back on his haunches, "Weird place, that one. Turned into a fucking lion while I was there. Anyway, I was bored, so I checked to see if you or Saïx were going to be back any time soon."

"What the hell were you thinking, going after a fucking blizzard? What use is a damn water element in the snow?" Axel shot him a Look, stern and accusatory.

"Saïx sent me here," Demyx mumbled. Axel began muttering something under his breath, but Demyx wasn't listening anymore. He sat up, staring around the mountainside where, what felt like mere moments ago, there had been a nest of violent, angry Heartless.

The mountainside was almost completely bare, barren of everything including snow. All that remained of the previously fluffy, white ground were great mud puddles littering the area around them, a twenty foot circle in all directions. Several Heartless that had yet to disintegrate into darkness lay scattered on the ground. Two were still burning, another impaled on a bloody, black chakram. Demyx felt the bile rise in his throat.

"Thank you," he said quietly. Axel stopped his mumbled rant mid-breath, staring at the blond.

"Well sure," the redhead mumbled, scratching the back of his neck, "isn't that what friends do?"

_Oh, good, befriend the sadistic pyromaniac_, Zexion's words flashed in his head, disappearing as quickly as they came. As he looked around at the destruction surrounding them, destruction done without hesitation because Demyx had needed his help, he considered that maybe befriending the sadistic pyromaniac wasn't the worst thing he could do.

"Before he died, Ienzo was my best friend."

Axel glanced up, thin eyebrows furrowed as he tried to scramble the letters.

"Since the first day of preschool; we were four. He was fourteen when he went missing, went up into Hollow Bastion one day and never came back. I used to go looking for him, sneak around the castle grounds trying to find him. Never thought I'd see him again."

"You're from Radiant Gardens too?"

Demyx nodded slowly, turning a fresh eye on Axel. He tried to imagine the boy he would have been, stripped of the black leather, the teardrop tattoos, the hardened look in his eyes. He could almost remember, if he squinted hard enough, a red haired boy with a goofy smile and a mean arm, constantly balancing a flame colored Frisbee on a fingertip.

"My best friend and I were both caught up in Maleficent's raid. We escaped the initial attack, but we didn't last long before they caught up with us."

"What happened to your friend?" Demyx asked carefully. He wasn't entirely sure he wanted to know.

"Isa died," Axel smirked, the bitter smile scraped across his sharp features.

Isa. Isa. I-S-A-X...oh.

"But you and Saïx barely speak."

The bitterness in Axel's smile grew exponentially more sour, poison laced in his acid green eyes. Demyx frowned. He didn't like seeing that expression on the normally vibrant face.

"You should talk to Zexion, Dem. Xemnas says we can't feel, we have no hearts, no emotions, and maybe he's right. But tell me that when that Heartless wrapped his hand around your throat you felt nothing."

Demyx stayed silent. Axel grinned, the cocky smile wiping away any trace of the bitterness left in his features. The redhead pushed himself to his feet, reaching down a hand to haul Demyx up with him.

"Their little meeting's probably over by now. He's probably in the library."

Demyx nodded, brushing the snow from his back as the redhead summoned his chakram from its place in the mud.

"And Dem?" the blond glanced back up at the redhead, head cocked to the side as he waited for the other boy to dismiss his weapons. "If you tell anyone I'm anything less than a heartless bastard, I'll set your room on fire."

For the first time since he'd been handed his black cloak, Demyx grinned.

* * *

Zexion sat perched in a high backed chair in the far corner of the library, just like Axel, and Demyx, knew he would be. His eyes flickered up briefly, disinterestedly, at the arrival of a second figure in his sanctuary. The gaze doubled back, cerulean eyes wide, as he registered the sight of the man standing before him.

Demyx stood with snow melting from his tattered and torn cloak, puddles under his feet, boots making a nauseating squelching noise on the marble floor. His face was still smeared with soot and the black blood of darkness, blending the bruises and scrapes on his neck into a Picasso portrait of mess. Amongst the ruin smeared across his features, the blond's eyes shone like aquamarines. Zexion gaped at him.

"Due to a slight error in judgment, I was seen fit to engage in combat with a nest of Heartless nestled into a blizzard on a mountaintop in the Land of Dragons," Demyx said conversationally. Zexion flinched. He, like Axel, was quick enough to understand what Saïx had failed to acknowledge.

"Rest assured, I'm alive," the blond continued dryly. He dropped himself into the seat opposite the slate haired Nobody, carefully peeling his ruined gloves from his fingers, "the 'sadistic pyromaniac' saved my life."

Zexion, at least, had the grace to look sheepish. A slightly flush tinged his pale cheekbones as he moved the book in his lap to the table between them, marking his page carefully before sliding it shut. He didn't quite look Demyx in the eye.

"It got me thinking, though," and here Demyx worked extra hard to keep his voice light, conversational, not to raise his voice again as they had last time, "about the first time I died. Would you like to know what happened?"

Zexion flinched again, and Demyx wondered if, perhaps, the Cloaked Schemer already knew the story. Regardless, the other boy still hadn't opened his mouth to speak, so the blond carried on.

"I snuck into Hollow Bastion."

Zexion stared at him, finally, azure eyes wide as the bore holes in the aqua-green gaze calmly meeting his. The slate haired man licked his thin lips, mouth slightly open as though he were going to speak. Demyx decided not to give him the chance.

"There was a rumor circulating through one of the survivor camps that someone had seen a man that looked shockingly similar to Even around the outer walls of the castle. Even had been assumed dead for almost two years at that point, but then again, so had you. I guess I figured that if _he_ was still wandering around Hollow Bastion, maybe you were too."

"Demyx…"

"I _died_, Zexion, because I got caught by one of Maleficent's Heartless while I was sneaking into your lab in the basement. Because there was a _rumor_ that somebody that _resembled_ your mentor may or may not have been seen around the general area of the castle."

Silence.

Demyx waited, bare fingers curled into the wet fringes of his cuffs, blinking through the grime and dried blood flaking on his cheeks, ocean eyes never leaving the pale, narrow face close enough to reach out and touch. Zexion sat frozen, eyes wide, lips parted, fingers twitching in his lap.

"Why are you telling me this?"

"Because I'd like to think that Dyme didn't die in _vain_, Zexion. Standing in a snowdrift with Heartless fingers wrapped around my throat and no viable weapon, my biggest regret was the thought that _I died_ in an attempt to find my best friend, and it all went to waste."

"Demyx, I told you, I am not –"

"I know. You're not Ienzo. But you know what, I'm not asking you to be. I'm not Dyme either. They died. I get that. But they were friends for _ten years_; that has to count for something. Can't we at least try?"

"The purest form of friendship is the recognition of a kindred soul between two individuals and the desire to satisfy this kindred soul in a variety of different ways," Zexion said quietly. His eyes had fallen back to the book on the tabletop, a laser gaze into the leather bound cover.

"If you want the textbook definition, sure."

Zexion still refused to meet his stare, eyes locked firmly on the book's title, _Cor et Animus_. Demyx didn't speak Latin.

"Friendship is based on feeling, on the ability to feel sympathy, empathy, compassion, companionship, desire, pleasure, satisfaction. Nobodies are incapable of such things."

"So?"

The moment those stunningly azure eyes met his, Demyx wished they hadn't. The depths of Zexion's eyes held a cold detachedness that he had never imagined he would ever have seen in his best friend's brilliant gaze. He knew the answer before his colleague even opened his mouth, already gathering his sopping gloves between his wrinkled fingers.

"Nobodies don't have friends, Demyx. They aren't capable of it."

* * *

"Are you _insane_, Saïx? Do you even pay attention to who you're assigning to each mission when you dole out the assignments in the morning? First you sent Demyx into a damn blizzard, and now you want _me_ to go do recon in _Atlantica?_ Do you know where Atlantica is, Saïx? It's _underwater._"

Axel's strained voice echoed off the large glass window, catching Demyx' attention long before he entered the Gray Area. The blond sitarist took in the scene as he finally crossed the threshold of the room; Axel standing with his hands on his hips, mission statement crumpled in his hand, Saïx with his arms crossed over his chest, wholly unimpressed by the redhead screaming in his face. Xigbar and Xaldin sat on the couches on the opposite side of the room comparing weapon blades in loud voices, apparently doing their best to ignore the argument across the hall. Zexion, sitting alone, Lexicon in his lap, watched with a frown creasing his eyebrows.

"Your mission, Number Eight, is to warp to Atlantica and perform a reconnaissance –"

" I WILL LITERALLY DIE, YOU DAFT PRICK."

"It's just a little water, Axel."

Demyx had never in his life wanted to hit anyone as badly as he did Saïx, smug smirk firm across his scarred face. He considered Arpeggio, only a finger twitch away. See what Saïx thought about "just a little water" after _he_ was through with him. But he knew all too well, despite his desire to help Axel, that attacking Saïx would only make it worse.

"I'll trade."

Axel grinned at him, shaking his head. Saïx didn't even blink, flicking his amber eyes to study Demyx for only a second before turning back to the riled up redhead.

"You are assigned to a search and destroy mission in the Pride Lands, Number Nine."

"Perfect. Axel was there two days ago, he knows the place much better than I do." Demyx kept his eyes trained on Saïx' face regardless of the fact that the blue haired man wouldn't look at him. "Just give him my statement and I'll –"

"You are assigned to this mission, Number Nine, and therefore _you_ will be –"

"What _difference_ does it make who goes, as long as it gets done? Besides, Demyx is better at recon than I am, and I like fighting more than –"

"_Your_ mission, Number Eight, is –"

"— to shove one of my chakrams straight up your –"

"Are you _threatening_ your superior, Number –"

Someone behind them coughed. Demyx, closing his eyes briefly in a silent prayer of thanks, turned to face the newcomer in their argument. Xigbar stood with his arms crossed over his broad chest, one arrowgun still clenched in his hand.

"Axel, Demyx," the heavily scarred man nodded to each Nobody respectively, "Number Seven. We couldn't help but overhear your charming and truly heartwarming conversation."

"Number Two," Saïx's acknowledging nod was closer to a bow than a friendly gesture, nearly digging his chin into his chest, "I apologize if we disturbed your discussion with Number Three. Number Eight and Number Nine are just having a little bit of difficulty grasping that –"

"As if!" Xigbar snorted, raising an eyebrow at the younger Nobody. Saïx' face paled. "Tell me, Saïx, if Axel and Demyx were to take the missions you assigned them, go off into another room, switch missions, writer their respective reports, and then sign the other's name on the report, would you know the difference?"

"I would imagine that some of the nuances in speech patterns and handwritings –"

"Give them their requested assignments."

"But –"

"Now."

Demyx wasn't naïve enough to think that the situation was entirely resolved, but it was, at the very least, resolved enough that Saïx bitterly thrust the assignment in his hands at the smirking redhead, wrenching the crumpled paper from Axel's fist and handing _that_ assignment to Demyx. Xigbar watched with a raised eyebrow, arms still firm over his chest, and Saïx bit back whatever retort Demyx could see building behind those rapidly yellowing eyes.

Stiffly, still under the watchful eye of the Organization's Number II, Saïx distributed the remaining assignments to Xaldin and Zexion before stalking from the room without another word, his own mission clenched so tightly in his glove that the paper had begun to tear. Axel watched him go with a satisfaction that wouldn't leave his malachite eyes for days.

"Thanks, Xiggy." Demyx smiled at the older Nobody, whose heavily scarred face split into a cheerful grin as he nodded and dropped his arms back down to the sides. He reached his free hand up and ruffled Demyx' blond hair, snickering as the blond in question hissed and batted his hands away.

"Anytime, kid."

Still smirking, hands still batting away at the hands reaching for his spiked hair, Demyx led Xigbar and Axel, bickering cheerfully with Xigbar about whose weapon was better, from the wide, cold room. Zexion, brow still furrowed with a frown, followed their departure with both steel blue eyes.

* * *

Demyx wasn't particularly surprised when the Superior requested a meeting with Numbers Eight and Nine; he had not expected Saïx to let them go unpunished for their stunt with the mission assignments. What he hadn't expected was for Xemnas to calmly, and surprisingly rationally, agree that maybe it was not in the Organization's best interest to send its members into situations in which they would not be able to perform to their optimum capabilities. In the future, he promised them, their particular _talents_ would be taken into consideration.

"I'm slightly…appalled."

Axel snorted, glancing sideways at the blond walking next to him. They left Xemnas' study together with barely concealed smirks, both openly relieved to have gotten off the hook so easily.

"What, did you _want_ to be strung up by your fingernails?" Axel teased. Demyx laughed.

"No thank you, but he barely even blinked at us. We were openly disrespectful and mocking to a superior member; what happened to Big, Scary, Bat Shit Crazy Xemnas everyone's warned me about?"

Axel chuckled, scratching the back of his neck with one gloved hand. He had been primarily responsible for feeding Demyx story after story of their creepy leader, call him what you will, but the man was a _psycho_.

"For him it all comes down to the advancement of the Organization's primary objective," Axel explained, assuming a exaggeratedly prim lecture tone, "the collection of hearts, and the completion of Kingdom Hearts, is of the utmost importance. If his subordinates are incapable of completing said missions to collect hearts, then the completion of Kingdom Hearts is unattainable, and that simply _will not do_."

"So it doesn't matter what we want, as long as you don't shrivel up and die because some idiot accidentally tried to drop you in an ocean for several hours, because then you can't collect hearts?"

"Get it memorized, Dem."

"Memorize this, Red, your catchphrase is _exceptionally stupid_."

"More or less stupid than your hair?"

Demyx shoved the other Nobody's shoulder, sending the redhead careening into the wall. Axel hit the wall with a thud, sticking out one absurdly long leg and catching Demyx with his foot, sending the blond sprawling. Laughter echoed down the hallway as Demyx caught himself on the hem of Axel's black coat, tugging the redhead down onto the cold marble with him. The redhead squealed, _squealed_, like a little girl, the sound blending with the general ruckus of laughter, insults, guffaws, and wheezing reverberated off the empty hallway as the two rolled across the floor, wrestling for submission.

It was only after Axel, always the fighter, slammed a squirming Demyx' shoulders into the floor, one knee pinning the blond's hip to the cold ground, panting around their mutual case of the giggles, that they noticed the presence of a third Nobody in the hallway.

Zexion stood with his arms stiff at his sides, watching the pair on the ground from under his fringe of slate colored hair. Axel quickly released his hold on the newest Nobody, mirthful expression suddenly blank as he kept his eyes pointedly away from Zexion's face. Their superior did _not_ look pleased.

"Number Nine," he said quietly, ice laced through his carefully structured voice, "if you are not too busy flirting with Number Eight, I need to speak with you."

"S-sure," Demyx clambered to his feet in what was possibly the least graceful manner he'd ever managed, tripping over the tangle of legs and limbs as he attempted to extricate himself from Axel. Zexion waited with the patience of an executioner preparing his first victim, a long suffering sigh escaping his pale lips as he narrowed his eyes at the redhead on the floor. Axel's gloved hands reached to unhook the blond's zipper from where it was tangled in the redhead's boot laces, wincing as Zexion cleared his throat.

Finally free, barely daring to exchange one quick look with the boy on the floor, Demyx followed his superior through a portal now ripped in the air, accompanying him down the corridor and out into another part of the castle several steps behind like the respectful servant to a king. He had _never_ before seen that look in those azure eyes.

"I am so pleased to see that you heeded my advice regarding Number Eight."

Zexion still had his back to him, leading him down one row and across another, a particularly quiet corner in the already silent library. Demyx felt something akin to regret as he considered the very real possibility that one or both of them was about to shatter that silence into thousands of infinitesimal pieces.

"I thought you said Nobodies couldn't be friends, Zexion. That would make it rather hard for me to _befriend_ another member of the Organization, wouldn't it?" The question was rhetorical, and they both knew it, but as Zexion whirled on the spot, finally turning to face the taller boy, his mouth was slightly open, as though he were going to answer anyway. He pressed his lips together instead, the pale whiteness of the skin surrounding his mouth betraying the force of the action as the slate haired boy tried to appear unruffled.

"Forgive me for my inappropriate word choice, then. Exchange 'befriend' for 'spend time with,' 'get to know,' 'acquaint yourself with,' 'associate with,' take your pick."

"If I didn't know better, Zexion, I'd think you were _jealous_."

Zexion froze. His entire body stood on the precarious edge of _something_ unidentifiable, rigidly tense as he stared at the blond standing mere feet away. The statement was so veryabsurd that it was impossible to decide where to even start ripping away at its very suggestion. Demyx took away that option with a single flourish of his hand and a parting of his lips.

"Of course, Nobodies can't feel, so Nobodies can't get jealous, but if you weren't a Nobody? If you had a heart, had the ability to feel those oh so elusive emotions? This one would be called jealousy. I see you, Zexion. Don't think I don't. I see the look in your eyes and the set in your jaw when you watch Axel and me at dinner, Xigbar and Xaldin sharpening their stakes together. I see you."

"What you are seeing, Demyx, is apparently a hallucination, because you are clearly making the entire thing up in your –"

"But of course, you are the expert on illusions and delusions. You're so good at them, in fact, that you've even managed to use them on yourself. There is proof _right in front of your eyes_, Zexion, that just because we don't have hearts it doesn't mean that we can't enjoy a sense of camaraderie with our colleagues."

"You have no proof."

Demyx threw two frustrated hands in the air, wracking his brain for examples of moments he knew Zexion had witnessed, knew Zexion had at least been privy to, something that might demonstrate friendship between the members of the Organization.

"Xigbar stuck up for Axel and me when Saïx tried to kill us."

"It would be ill advised to allow one of our members to eliminate two of the others. You two are, supposedly, useful." Zexion scoffed, firmly avoiding looking at Demyx' face. Demyx bit back a retort, thoughts intent instead on finding more proof.

"Axel saved my life. Said it's what friends do."

"Again, it would not behoove us to lose a member. Axel is also the _last_ person who should be doling out advice on friendships."

The muscle in his jaw twitched as he casually disregarded Demyx' importance as an individual. Demyx glared. Zexion ignored him.

"Xigbar –"

"Your evidence is anecdotal, at best. You have nothing of any substance to convince me either that Nobodies are capable of friendship, or that Nobodies are capable of feelings that could potentially support a friendship. All you have are stories of Nobodies trying to project memories of a past life to force themselves to believe that they will not spend this half-life of existence _alone_."

"You don't have to be alone, Zexion." Demyx' entire demeanor shifted. His voice was soft, gentle, sea green eyes wide as he tried to meet the other boy's rapidly moving gaze. He moved forward, fingers stretching out, then thought better of it, dropping his hand to his side. "You don't. You don't have to be alone."

Zexion laughed humorlessly, narrowing his eyes as his stare finally settled on the fold of leather on Demyx' left shoulder.

"We are all alone, Demyx. That is all we will ever be."

And much to the slate haired Nobody's chagrin, the blond just smiled. It was a sad smile, bitter and resigned and pitying, reflecting in eyes that had no business being that bright.

"You've always been this stubborn, Zo. It's almost nice to know you always will be. But you're wrong, and I'll prove it to you."

Before Zexion could protest, before he could argue about the use of Dyme's old nickname for Ienzo, before he could unclench his jaw enough to snap back with something witty and sharp that would leave a burning hiss across Demyx' pride, the blond turned quietly on his heel and strode away, losing himself in the stacks.

* * *

It is not until he catches sight of himself in the window that Demyx begins to calm down. The night sky makes the clear glass surface echo his reflection back to him, and the sight that meets him is both achingly familiar and something he hasn't seen in months.

His face is flushed, brow furrowed, stare still intense though he no longer has Zexion to look at. He relaxes the hands still clenched at his sides, the leather sticking and sliding to his sweaty palms. He remembers this look. He remembers his blood boiling when it was still pulsing through his veins, jaw hard and nostrils flared, yelling at Ienzo for spending so much time at that damn castle. This is what _anger _looks like.

Demyx feels it draining from his stiff shoulders and rigid spine as he studies himself in the library window. He knows this is anger, knows it exists, knows he feels it, knows that Zexion in particular makes him feel it when he so much as walks into the same room. Now he just has to prove it.

It becomes something of an obsession over the next few weeks, driven by a feeling that Demyx is not entirely familiar with. Much to Xigbar's surprise and Axel's amusement, Demyx begins to spend all his free time in the library, pointedly avoiding the areas in which he knows Zexion likes to sit, reading every book he can find on theories of emotion, neurological and biological causes of emotion, and the few books he can find on the existence of Heartless and Nobodies. Sometimes, on slow days, Axel comes to "help" him, mostly just sitting in the library keeping the blond company as he slowly drags himself through dull, boring text after text.

Xigbar is only slightly more helpful, although Axel's presence may or may not be the only thing salvaging what remains of Demyx' sanity. Xigbar corners him one after while they're supposed to be scouting out Hades' Kingdom, demanding to know why Demyx has suddenly become the second person ever to actually _use_ the library. Xigbar does not attempt to hide his laughter when Demyx tells him.

"You're fighting a losing battle there, kid," he chuckles, backing off the blond and leading the way back down the hollow cavern he'd pushed Demyx down. Demyx was careful to keep his voice casual in his response.

"You don't think we can feel either?"

"As if! Come on kid, you know as well as I do that's a load of crock. If we couldn't feel, then we wouldn't be able to have desire, motivation, or need, all of which is required to create an organization with the purpose of restoring our hearts. If we didn't _desire_ our hearts this badly then none of us would give a damn about completing Kingdom Hearts."

The slump of Demyx' suddenly relaxed shoulders felt like relief, and maybe Xigbar saw it in his face, because he laughed, throwing an arm around the younger boy's shoulders.

"I only say you're fighting a losing battle, Dem, because Zexion may be the very last person in this entire Organization, save maybe Xemnas, to ever believe that. He's a stubborn little bitch, that one."

Demyx laughed. Nobody knew better than he just how much of a stubborn little bitch Zexion could be.

Reassured by his conversation with Xigbar, who knew much more about the existence and the life of Nobodies than either he or Axel ever would, Demyx redoubled his efforts in the library, combing through book after book, desperate for quantifiable proof for something he has already proven to himself. Once or twice he is convinced he catches sight of slate hair and azure eyes peering out from behind a stack, but he and Zexion had been making their best efforts to avoid each other, so he doubted it.

It was, as it usually is, such a painfully obvious answer that by the time Demyx came across the text that was _exactly_ what he was looking for, he was fairly horrified to realize that he hadn't considered this as a viable answer weeks ago. He'd even made a mental note of himself after his last fight with Zexion, had seen the evidence of his anger on his face and in his figure. How had he possibly not considered the physiological effects of emotion on a person?

It was two parts science and one part anecdote, but Demyx didn't care. It was the closest to scientific proof he was going to get; either Zexion would accept this proof or nothing was going to convince him.

Demyx sat in the library for what he hoped, oh god, he hoped, was the last time. Disregarding what Zexion would probably do to him for writing in one of his precious library books, the blond sat with a pen and the book on the physiology of emotions, carefully marking, underlining, and annotating. He made notes in the margins of his personal observations of these signs, particularly citing anger as the primary emotion of example. By the time he was finished the book had more of his own handwriting than standard textbook font, each important page neatly tagged and bookmarked.

The windows showed the night sky, but other than that he had no way of knowing the time. He may have missed dinner, he may even be close to missing breakfast. Demyx didn't particularly care; he crossed the library with quiet, confident strides, weaving through the stacks until he came to the table he knew to be Zexion's favorite.

The slate haired Nobody glanced up from the book he had been perusing, molten eyes blinking twice as often as he took in the sight of the blond sitarist standing before him. Demyx crossed the empty space between them silently, pressing the book containing his last attempt to the wooden tabletop. Zexion kept his eyes trained on the shiny cover as Demyx slid it across the table, the smaller boy's hand coming up to meet the hardcover book as it drew progressively closer.

Without saying a word, Demyx turned and walked away. He ignored the tell-tale creak of a book binding being pressed open.

* * *

As Demyx strode down the hallway towards his room he found himself wishing that he really _was_ incapable of feeling any kind of emotion. His mind raced through a slew of different thoughts and possibilities, dancing from fear to anger to nerves to indifference to impatience to confusion, melting and molding and reshaping itself into a conglomerate of experiences the blond couldn't even begin to name. He threw his door open with a bang, ignoring the way it ricocheted off the barren wall as he stormed through the open doorway.

The onslaught of emotions drained slowly over the course of the hours, or maybe days, he spent sitting there, staring unseeingly at the ceiling over his bed, thoughts slowing to a gentle buzz as he realized that he would be waiting an indeterminable period of time for any sign of reaction. He allowed himself to get comfortable; removed his coat, gloves, and boots, summoned his sitar, propped his back against his headboard as he strummed lazy tune after lazy tune from the blue instrument cradled between his knees.

He jumped nearly a foot off the bed at the knock on his door.

Arpeggio vanished as he leapt from the soft white bed, crossing the room inhumanly fast and wrenching the door open. Zexion, one fist poised to knock again, stood frozen in his doorway, cerulean eyes fixed pointedly on the blond's exposed clavicle. Demyx felt his face heat up; in his haste to answer the door, he'd forgotten entirely that he'd stripped down to nothing more than his leather pants.

Zexion carefully ripped his gaze off the other Nobody's bare chest, turning his stare instead to meet the aquamarine eyes. Only one of the beautiful blue eyes was visible from behind the sheet of slate hair; Demyx stamped down on the urge to rain an entire bucketful of water over his head, wetting that damn hair enough to slick it back out of his superior's face.

"I read your notes," Zexion said quietly, and Demyx noticed for the first time that Zexion had what looked suspiciously like a textbook clutched to his chest, "and I am willing to admit that your hypothesis is sound. Your evidence, however, is still anecdotal, so I am here to conduct an experiment."

Utterly speechless, Demyx stood back and opened his door wider, wordlessly inviting the other Nobody in. Zexion crossed the threshold quietly, _nervously_, fingers tight on the book's binding doing little to hide the way his hands were shaking. The slate haired boy stopped in the center of the room, slowly taking in the bare walls, the sparsely decorated room, pointedly looking anywhere but at Demyx. The blond closed the door with a quiet snap, leaning back against it.

"You applied your theory to anger which, at best, only proves the existence of the most volatile and easily sparked emotions. It could very easily be explained by the fact that we are defined as a higher form of Nobodies precisely because we can remember what it was like to have emotions, and certainly anger would be one of the strongest memories in any of our minds."

Demyx opened his mouth to protest, but Zexion silenced him with a look before the blond so much as uttered a sound. He stared at the slate haired Nobody, the master illusionist, whose ice blue gaze was quiet suddenly locked on the blond's own aqua colored eyes. Neither spoke for a long moment, Demyx waiting for Number Six to continue making his point, hoping despite himself that _somewhere_ in that assessment there was a 'but.'

"However," and here Demyx couldn't help a small sigh of relief, "for the purposes of experimentation I am willing to suspend disbelief for a moment."

"What kind of experimentation…" Demyx trailed off, distracted by the sudden sound of the book being tossed unceremoniously onto his dresser, followed almost immediately by the sound of footsteps. Zexion was slowly moving closer, closing the distance between them until he was only a step or two away.

"I had had a _different_ emotion in mind before coming here, but we may have accidentally already jump started the experiment the second you opened the door."

Zexion's eyes moved slowly over Demyx' high cheekbones, trailed down his tense jaw and lightly gold neck, lower over the taut skin and lightly muscled chest. The slate haired boy's cheeks were flushed, pupils dilated, and with the suddenness of a blow to the chest Demyx remembered the last time they stood this close. He remembered them screaming, him begging Ienzo to stay home, Ienzo asking why, Dyme curling one hand around the back of the other boy's neck, fingers tightening in the soft gray hair. Zexion was close enough that if he reached out now, Demyx could curl those same fingers around that same neck again, press his lips against those same lips and _beg him_ not to go.

"Tell me, Demyx," Zexion said quietly. He shifted forward slightly, closing the distance between them just enough to make Demyx suddenly aware of the way his palms were sweating and his face was flushed, "do you_ feel_ anything right now?"

And suddenly the distance between them became nonexistent, and Demyx wasn't sure which of them moved first or which of them had thrown them backward into the wall or _who_, exactly, was making _that noise_, but he did know that his fingers were threaded through that mercury colored hair, that Zexion's hands were pinning his hips to the wall, that despite all of his insistence that he _wasn't_ Ienzo, the other Nobody still _tasted_ like Dyme's best friend.

Zexion broke the kiss first, pulling back just far enough to be able to look Demyx in the eye, still pressed flush against the blond from the chest down. Demyx stayed as quiet and still as he possibly could, waiting for Zexion to reach whatever conclusion it was the Schemer was searching for.

"I believe," Zexion whispered, close enough that his breath still ghosted over Demyx' wet lips, "that you have successfully proven the existence of at least three emotions that Nobodies are capable of feeling."

"Three?"

"You make me so _angry_, Demyx," Zexion smirked at the scowl slowly spreading across Demyx' face. He halted its progress with the barest hint of lips pressing against lips, secretly pleased with the way the sour expression almost instantly receded. "It took me a while to separate the anger from the insane _attraction_."

Rather then remove his lips entirely from the newer Nobody's face Zexion had merely rerouted them, ghosting over the soft skin of Demyx' jaw. The blond's breathing hitched.

"You said…three," he panted, eyes drifting closed of their own accord as Zexion pressed into a particularly sensitive spot under his ear. Demyx could feel the slate haired boy smile against the skin of his neck.

"I _missed_ you, Demyx," he whispered, tracing the lines of Demyx' ear with hot lips and a wicked tongue, "I really, really missed you."

And somewhere in the motion of forcing Zexion's lips back down to meet his own, propelling both figures backwards in the general direction of Demyx' bed, and working the zipper of Zexion's coat with frantic fingers, Demyx vaguely remembered repeating over and over again that he had missed him too.

* * *

reviews are to me as applause is to Tinkerbell/Lady Gaga/Rachel Berry. =)


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